Editor's Introduction: Reeled into Complacency: How the CIA and the Pentagon Use Hollywood to Shape Our Ideas About Friends and Enemies

• Published date: 01 March 2017
• Date: 01 March 2017
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ajes.12185

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Volume 76 March 2017 Number 2

Editor’s Introduction:

Reeled into Complacency: How the CIA and

the Pentagon Use Hollywood to Shape Our

Ideas About Friends and Enemies

Introduction

When the Romans created an empire, to quell unrest, they used

brute force abroad and “bread and circuses” at home. When the

United States became the center of a new empire in the 20

th

centu-

ry, it followed the same model of force to crush foreign uprisings

and propaganda to limit dissent at home. This was an empire mostly

of indirect control, but it was backed by hundreds of military out-

posts. The Vietnam War is certainly well known, but many smaller

armed conflicts are not recounted in official records. For example,

we rarely hear of the U.S. concentration camps and extermination

campaigns in the Philippines from 1900 to 1902 in which 250,000

“rebel” soldiers and civilians died of wounds or disease (Valentino

2004: 207; Ramsey 2007: 103). The propaganda side of the empire is

not well known, but it has been a massive operation, and the extent

of it has been more secret than covert operations to overthrow for-

eign governments. We Americans pay twice for propaganda that

American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Vol. 76, No. 2 (March, 2017).

DOI: 10.1111/ajes.12185

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C2017 American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Inc.

paints a misleading picture of conflict in the world and how the

United States deals with it. As taxpayers, we fund the agencies that

screen and filter news and images, and then, as consumers, we pay

for the products of propaganda (books, newspapers, and movies)

that lull us into complacency. Because movies play such an impor-

tant role as instruments of cultural self-definition, the American film

industry is an integral part of this process.

This issue examines how American movie and television pro-

ducers have permitted the CIA and the U.S. Defense Department to

modify or draft scripts of productions that will be viewed both in

the United States and abroad. The individual authors examine differ-

ent elements of this complex relationship. I will summarize their

articles later in this introduction, but first I wish to pull back from

the immediacy of the “CIA-Pentagon-Hollywood nexus” to examine

the larger questions at stake in terms of national security and the

role of disinformation in sustaining or undermining it. Government

involvement in the entertainment business only makes sense as part

of a broader effort to limit dissent in the United States by managing

the information available to citizens.

Security as a Balancing Act

Freedom and security are important national goals, but they are also

subject to abuse. Neither goal can be achieved in absolute terms.

Individual freedom must be balanced with the freedom of others

and with duties each of us owes. Security is always temporary, since

life is inherently insecure. When a nation achieves those goals as a

result of its disproportionate power, other nations suffer. Increasing

the freedom and security available to one person or group may

reduce the freedom and security attainable by others. Unless those

aims are achieved universally and by cooperation, those who lose

will resist and react, which can lead to greater instability for all units

in the system. The creation of an island of order in a sea of entropy

increases the total entropy of a system.

The national security system in the United States is set up to

ignore feedback in the system of global order. To create greater

security and personal freedom for citizens of the United States, the

The American Journal of Economics and Sociology234

Department of Defense (DoD) and the Central Intelligence Agency

(CIA) take actions that reduce security and freedom elsewhere in

the world. Unilateral actions achieve short-term gains for the United

States, but at the cost of reduced goodwill from partners.

The task of claiming and policing the petroleum-rich lands of

western and central Asia as part of the American sphere of influence

is a prime example of unilateralism. That policy was first enunciated

by President Jimmy Carter (1980), who said in the final days of his

presidency:

Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to

gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on

the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault

will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.

If the agents of U.S. foreign policy can succeed in making the sup-

ply of energy to Americans more secure, they are, in effect, making

the rest of the world less secure. Since other nations are reluctant to

accept the status assigned them by the United States, they resist. The

secondary and tertiary consequences of unilateral projection of force

by the United States make the world system less stable, reducing

freedom and security for everyone.

We do not need to speculate about the motives of the CIA and

the Defense Department to understand the willingness of the United

States to use military power to preserve the privileged economic sta-

tus of the United States. The doctrinal statements of American Presi-

dents Monroe, Truman, Carter, Reagan, and George W. Bush have

made clear that the foreign policy interests of the United States are

expansive and backed by force, both overt and covert. To anyone

living outside the United States, the message has been crystal clear:

the United States has effectively declared itself the world’s landlord

and resistance to its power will be met with swift punishment. There

is no particular logic to any of these doctrines, as far back as the

Monroe Doctrine, except for the logic of power. However, “might

makes right” is not a stable principle that can be applied in interna-

tional law. When Germany referred to the Monroe Doctrine in 1939

to justify in international law its invasion of Eastern Europe, the

United States regarded that as blatant aggression (Nunan 2011: 11).

Editor’s Introduction 235